But thinking made Evan's head thump. He decided it would be a good idea to catch a McCaul car and connect with the ferry for Island Park. He boarded the car, together with one or two women and a little girl carrying a lunch indigestible anywhere but on Centre Island.
The beauty and quietude of Toronto's rest resort and the sparkling freshness of the surrounding water, revived Evan a little; but a stronger liquid than H2O was around his brain somewhere, and the Island became uncomfortable. In spite of the pleasant environment he found himself unable to take his mind off the bank and what it had done to him. Early in the afternoon, he suddenly imagined that he could endure no longer to sit and worry, so he took the ferry back to the city and went to the office of the Star.
After inserting an advertisement for a position as bookkeeper—saying nothing about recommendations—he waited around the Star office with a crowd of other work-seekers until the afternoon edition emanated from the large mouth of a small newsboy. He felt more like crawling away in some alley and dying than hunting a job, but he was anxious to obliterate the bank from his mind; and besides, he wanted to have another situation before writing home that he had quit the bank.
Evan did not have the faintest intention of telling his people he had been fired. They would not understand it, he knew. How could they understand such medieval work? This was not a day of inquisitions or guillotines! But when he was established in a better position than the one he had left, it would be easy to explain that he had resigned. He knew that his father was not much in favor of banking anyway.
The first ad that attracted the ex-clerk belonged to an abattoir company near the lake-front. He wasted no time in getting to their office.
"Where have you been working?" asked the manager.
"In the S—— Bank," replied Evan.
"Why did you leave?"
"My salary was too small."
"Well, I believe you will be all right. Just drop in to-morrow morning at nine o'clock, Mr. Nelson, and I think I can put you to work."